Israel and the Hope of the West
Sinwar is dead, and the world is better for it.
At times during this dispiriting election, it’s been tempting to imagine that America and the West are in decline. Has it really come to this – an embarrassing reality-show-host who had a hand in a disgraceful attack on the seat of the American government running against a hackish politician who has threatened to pack the Supreme Court? But sometimes news from across the world brings us hope.
This past week, an Israeli tank killed Yahya Sinwar, the leader of Hamas and the mastermind behind the October 7th attacks. Let us pause to reflect a moment on the fact that justice has been done. This man deserved to die. Sinwar is directly responsible for the deaths of more Jews than anyone since Adolf Hitler. At last, the victims of October 7th are avenged.
This came less than three weeks after the assassination of Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah (whose death was celebrated by many of the Lebanese citizens his men abused). For the first time in my life, I’m beginning to see the possibility of lasting peace in the Middle East. In the coming days or weeks, Israel (hopefully with US support) may strike directly at Iran, the source of the instability and suffering the region endures.
But even if they do not cripple Iran’s nuclear program, the Israelis have managed in the last several months to turn around a terrible war and deal knockout blows to its two longtime tormentors – Hamas and Hezbollah.
Some in America lament Sinwar’s death. We might rightly ask why. Why is the death of an evil man who stood in the way of peace for Gazans a tragedy? They will tell us that they truly believe his killing makes peace less likely and furthers a cycle of violence which will only bring more suffering to the Middle East, but when someone consistently sheds more tears at the deaths of terrorists than at the murder of Jewish children, we know their true colors. Yayha Sinwar was standing in the way of a brighter future for Gaza, and his killing hastens that day.
The simpleminded imagine that wars are won by killing the bad guys. The more sophisticated will tell you that you can’t kill an idea and when you eliminate one terrorist, ten more rise in his place. But (as happens sometimes) the brightest minds often agree with the simplest. Only the wars which end decisively tend to stay ended, and it’s hard for a terrorist organization to recruit when most of its members (and especially its leadership) are dead.
The last two months have seen a string of victories for a beleaguered Netanyahu, who has been controversial for years, went into the conflict deeply unpopular, and became even more unpopular after October 7th. He may emerge something of a controversial hero, redeemed in the end by a successful war, even if he gets the Winston Churchill treatment as soon as the war is ended.
A year ago, the world looked very dark for Israel and for the West. Today, Israel is crippling its enemies and paving the path to lasting peace throughout the Arab world. Israel is bearing the majority of the burden in the ongoing war on terror, and it’s managing to win. That it is doing so despite fighting almost entirely alone is further demonstration of the tenacity of the Jewish people, who learned the hard way in the twentieth century that nobody was going to protect them, nobody was coming to save them, and that if they wanted to have a future, they had to guarantee that themselves. In doing so, they defeat the West’s enemies and prove that our civilization is not in irrevocable decline.
Before turning back to American politics, I will pause to add one final thought. The common denominator in all of the trouble in the Middle East, the source of funding for all of Israel’s enemies, is Iran. Iran is the thorn which will have to be dealt with if there is to be lasting peace. There used to be a second common denominator, which similarly sowed great destruction and evil throughout the Middle East and the rest of the world, which ensured the Arab world would be enmeshed in permanent Islamic revolution. It, too, hated Israel and supported every effort to kill Jews.
I wonder how differently this war would have gone had Saddam Hussein’s regime still controlled Iraq. I believe that we are seeing how much better the Middle East is with Saddam gone. What would have happened had Saddam obtained nuclear weapons? Would Tel Aviv be standing? With Saddam in power, could the Abraham Accords have happened? Could Iran be increasingly isolated?
Perhaps someday George W. Bush will be hailed not as a failed president, but as a man who sacrificed his reputation in order to do some good in the world.
On the Home Front
If you haven’t watched Harris’s interview with Bret Baier, you aren’t going to watch it. It wasn’t a good interview on her part, but it was better than most of Trump’s fans say. The left cries foul and claims Bret Baier was unfair, but as Megan McCardle notes, for once Harris gets to experience what it’s like being a conservative and doing interviews with the mainstream media.
I think it was a smart strategy on her part. She needs to take risks and not sit in her basement. The goal of this interview wasn’t to persuade Republicans to vote for her, but to persuade Trump-skeptical Republicans to stay home instead of voting for Trump. She had to convince them not that she was a good candidate, but that she isn’t as bad as they fear, and I think she may have succeeded. We will know on election day.
I also think it's a smart strategy for her to go on the Joe Rogan Experience, if she in fact does this. Joe Rogan’s audience is larger than that of NBC and Fox combined. Many of his viewers are marginal voters, or don’t vote, and some of them may be persuadable. Rogan is a fair interviewer, and will try to give her the benefit of the doubt at times. If she can speak for three hours on a wide range of topics and manage to seem personable (i.e., by ditching the canned politician schtick), she may win new voters or convince some reluctant Trump voters to stay home.
It's a high-risk, high-reward strategy, because she isn’t used to the three-hour format. If she keeps to her talking points and repeats herself, it will go very badly.
Shifting Coalitions
Many have commented over the past eight years that the political coalitions of the two parties have shifted, such that the Republicans are now the party of the working class and the Democrats are the party of the educated. Ruy Texeira has pointed out that education is a better predictor of how someone will vote than race.
I can recall talk under Bush and Obama that America was due for another major realignment, with some wondering that one of the two of them would be the cause of it. We know now the realignment came with Trump, which is bad news for conservatives and classical liberals if these two coalitions hold, because a debate between progressives and populists leaves little room for us. However, it remains to be seen whether these coalitions outlast Trump. I remain hopeful that the growing Latino population could be a natural constituency for conservatism, seeing as many Latinos love America, start businesses, fled or had relatives who fled statist countries, are traditionalist Christians, and dislike illegal immigration. (I would like the record to reflect the fact that George W. Bush received a higher share of the Latino vote than Donald J. Trump.)
The reason I raise shifting coalitions is not to dwell on the future, but to offer a theory about 2024. Anecdotally, I notice more and more traditionally conservative Republicans who are refusing to support Trump, including some who voted for him once or twice. I also see more disaffected Democrats coming over to his side. It’s worth pointing out the sheer strength of Trump’s support among former Democrats in good standing – Tulsi Gabbard, RFK Jr., Elon Musk, Kanye West, Bill Ackman, Matt Taibbi, Amber Rose, etc.
I wouldn’t be surprised at this point if Glenn Greenwald voted for Trump.
I don’t view this as a positive. With the exception of Ackman, a successful businessman who defected from the Democrats to punish the far left on their Israel stance, the figures on this list are controversial and not particularly aligned with conservative governance. Gabbard is an apologist for Assad. RFK Jr. argued Hurricane Katrina was nature’s revenge on red states for climate denial. I liked Elon Musk better when he focused on running successful businesses rather than retweeting conspiracy theorists.
If Trump wins with this new coalition, conservative priorities will continue to be sidelined. The makeover of the Republican Party will continue apace, and the Democratic Party doesn’t look like it will ever be receptive to conservative ideas. Soon, there will be no room at all for anyone who believes in American hegemony abroad, free markets at home, and traditional virtue.
Bill Clinton and Newt Gingrich both knew the importance of losing to win. If we’re playing the long game, the best thing for conservatives this election would be for Trump to lose and Republicans to win the Senate.
In Other News
If you haven’t seen my take on the “Man Enough” ad, you can read it here. If one side’s idea of masculinity has something to do with insecurity and voting for Kamala Harris and the other side seems to believe it’s embodied in a whiner who cameoed in porn flicks, we’ve lost any conception as a society of what it means to be a man (or, for that matter, a woman).
I would like to close by highlighting Jonathan Meilaender’s excellent piece on the American Solidarity Party, if you haven’t read it. It fits with the theme of today’s column. A Republican Party in which Tulsi Gabbard finds a new home is a party comfortable with the isolationist anti-American foreign policy Jonathan highlights in the American Solidarity Party. I’ve nothing against the ASP, and a friend of mine has voted for them in the past, but I do have a problem with the idea that “America is the bad guy” in the world.
Quite frankly, that level of error is willful. The people who assert it want to believe it. Roger Scruton coined the term “oikophobia” to describe someone who hates his or her country, and I think oikophobia drives this belief. One has to overlook evil dictators (see Gabbard and Assad), barbaric terrorists, and heinous regimes around the globe in order to assert that the real problem in the world is America. The only country, in human history, which ever won a conflict so decisively as to find itself on top of the world and then – instead of taking new territories and exacting tribute – used its own resources to rebuild its former enemies. The country which guarantees freedom of the seas for all trading nations, and asks nothing in return.
As Jonathan puts it, “this kind of thinking is unacceptable for a party that claims to emphasize virtue, the common good, and religion.”
“World peace, such as it is, rests on American military power. Europe is free from communism and fascism because of our arms. Indeed, Europe is at peace within itself only because America’s security blanket made economic union possible and eliminated the rivalries that created a thousand years of internal bloodshed. Ukraine is holding on because of those weapons sales American Solidarity thinks “fuel conflict.” China does not invade Taiwan because it fears us. American bombs and American weapons (along with Iraqi and Kurdish lives) eliminated ISIS. American fighter jets intercept Iranian missiles and keep the Red Sea open for trade.”
Ben Connelly is a writer, long-distance runner, former engineer, and author of “Grit: A Practical Guide to Developing Physical and Mental Toughness.” He publishes short stories and essays at Hardihood Books. @benconnelly6712
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